But about what exactly? Eating disorders. Yep, it’s time to talk about them, girls. That’s the slogan for the National Eating Disorders Association’s (NEDA’s) National Eating Disorders Awareness Week (NEDAW), February 21-27th 2010.

The goal of NEDAW is “to ultimately prevent eating disorders and body image issues while reducing the stigma surrounding eating disorders and improving access to treatment,” says the NEDAW website. “Eating disorders are serious, life-threatening illnesses — not choices — and it’s important to recognize the pressures, attitudes and behaviors that shape the disorder.”

And that’s what we’ll be doing on CollegeCandy all week long. We’ll be covering the basics: what eating disorders look like, how to help a friend in need, disordered eating and losing weight the healthy way. We want to bring this difficult and serious issue to the forefront and help our friends in need.

So what do eating disorders look like? Well, just like people, they come in all shapes and sizes. Signs of eating disorders are far more varied than most people think. Sure, looking emaciated might be a tip-off that something is wrong, but there are so many more things to be aware of.

Each eating disorder, (there are four main types – Anorexia Nervosa, Bulimia Nervosa, Binge Eating Disorder and Eating Disorders not otherwise specified), has it’s own set of signs and symptoms. Of course, many of these overlap.

If you find you or a friend exhibiting any of the behaviors below, please seek help from someone you trust. Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of any mental illness, and “a study by the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders reported that 5 – 10% of anorexics die within 10 years after contracting the disease; 18-20% of anorexics will be dead after 20 years and only 30 – 40% ever fully recover.” Scary stuff.

So what should you look for?

Anorexia Nervosa: Self-starvation and refusal to eat or maintain a weight at a healthy or normal level for one’s age, size, height and activity level. Intense fear of being fat in spite of excessive weight loss.

Symptoms:

Dramatic weight loss; preoccupation with dieting, weight, food, calories, and fat grams that interferes with one’s life; refusal to eat certain foods; denies feeling hungry; complaints of constipation, abdominal pain, cold intolerance, lethargy,and excess energy; avoids mealtimes or social functions involving food; resistance to maintaining normal body weight, comments about feeling “fat”; excessive and intense exercise regimen; loss of menstrual period; growth of thin body hair.

Bulimia Nervosa: Cycles of binge eating and purging (compensating for eating large amounts of food in a short period of time by vomiting, laxative abuse or over-exercising).

Symptoms:

Evidence of binge eating; evidence of purging; feels uncomfortable eating around others; develops food rituals; hides or hoardes food; drinks excessive amounts of water; uses mouthwash, mints or gum excessively; unusual swelling of cheeks or jaw; calluses on back of fingers or hands from inducing vomiting; extreme exercise habits; extreme concern with body weight or shape; looks bloated from fluid retention; discolored teeth. May be at a normal weight or overweight.

Binge Eating Disorder: Characterized by recurrent binge eating without regular use of compensatory measures to counter binge eating while feeling out of control, ashamed or disgusted over behavior.

Symptoms:

Excessive binge eating; food rituals; steals or hoards food; makes lifestyle changes to allow for binges; skips meals or takes small portions at mealtimes; periods of uncontrolled, impulsive, or continuous eating beyond the point of feeling comfortably full; engages in sporadic fasting or repetitive dieting. Body weight may be average, low, above average or obese.

Eating Disorders Not Otherwise Specified (EDNOS): Includes some combination of the signs and symptoms of the above disorders, but not all of the criteria necessary to meet a specific diagnosis. Like all eating disorders, EDNOS are physically dangerous and emotionality destructive.

Symptoms: Any other above signs and symptoms.

[Tomorrow we'll share the best ways to approach a friend you think might be suffering from one of the above disorders. Come back and find out, from someone who's been through it before, the right and wrong way to help a friend.]

Here is Stacey’s story:

Don’t get me wrong, I love guys (I mean I LOVE guys), but what if the story had been different?  What if Adam had emerged from Eve’s rib instead of vice-versa?  Would we be living in an entirely different world?  Would a woman’s success be gauged monetarily and a man’s physically?  Would aggressiveness be seen as a feminine quality and submissiveness as masculine?  Would women eat whatever they wanted while men counted every one tenth of a calorie?  I have no idea, but I asked this five years ago when starting EvesRib.com, a company that promotes positive body image and self-esteem in girls and women through fashion, while donating a portion of our proceeds to the National Eating Disorders Association.  However, this was not the only thing that led to The Creation of Eve’s Rib.

I used to miss school because I was too ugly, miss parties because I was too fat, and miss life because I was too [insert any and all negative adjectives here.]  It was assumed that I would grow out of this after high school, but things only got worse.   While having a blast on the outside—seriously, an All-American, collegiate blast—I perfected the art of self-hatred on the inside, and no one was the wiser; sometimes not even myself.

After starving, binging, vomiting, over exercising, rinsing and repeating, I somehow sought help.  The people to come to my aid were not trained professionals, yet had been immersed in the field for years. Some were young girls, just like me, others were older men I had nothing in common with, other than we all disliked ourselves.  I met these people in a support group I had found online and soon began to truly care about them.  I listened to them talk about themselves with the same hate I had been throwing at myself for years.  Although there was a difference, they were all smart, beautiful, funny, useful, and capable people.

Then it hit me: if these amazing people hate themselves with the same force that I hate myself, just maybe I’m not so bad either. (If I were Oprah, I would call this my Aha! Moment, but I’m not, so I won’t.)

As I gained recovery, I realized that there are a lot of us who feel this way and need to be reminded multiple times a day that we are just “perfectly imperfect.”  So I began creating t-shirts with messages like “Obsessing Over Pounds is for British Bankers” and “Know Your Beauty,” this way when we look in the mirror or pass someone else wearing a shirt, we remember to love ourselves if even for just that second.

Now here comes the part I did not anticipate.  When I created EvesRib.com, I thought, I was “better,” and therefore, completely unaware of the recovery I’d receive through building this company.  Constantly promoting loving one’s body really starts to stick after discussing it a hundred times a day.  Though I originally started this project to help others, there is no doubt that I have reaped the most benefits.   Of course, however, this does not mean that I am superhuman.  At times, I still look in the mirror and balk at what I see; however these instances are now fewer and my rebound time is quicker.  In seconds, rather than hours, I am able to realize that I am none of those things I sometimes feel and I never was.

So, while the media continues to target body conscious young females, it’s important to keep in mind that eating disorders are an illness which have severe physical and emotional side effects. In our attempt to raise awareness we’re looking at the facts surrounding the illness that affects so many girls and women globally.

• It is estimated that 1 in 5 women struggle with an eating disorder of some kind, whether it is anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa or binge eating disorder, or somewhere in between.
• 10% of female college students suffer with eating disorders or disordered eating, of which, over half struggle with bulimia nervosa.
• 10-15% of people with anorexia or bulimia are males. And those are just the ones that have actually admitted they struggle with an eating disorder, as it has a reputation to be a disease that only effects women. In fact, there are thousands of males that struggle in secrecy every day.
• 80% of 13 year old girls have attempted to lose weight.
• A study by the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders reported that 5 – 10% of people with anorexia die within 10 years after contracting the disease; 18-20% will be dead after 20 years and only 30 – 40% ever fully recover.
• Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric illness.
• Outpatient treatment for eating disorders costs about $8,000 per week, if not more.
• An eating disorder can effect each organ system to the point of failure.  Cardiovascular system is stressed and heart rate can slow to the point of stopping.
• The heart muscle itself can also shrink, causing huge danger due to the same large volume of blood now pumping through a smaller heart.
• Electrolytes are thrown out of balance from continued bingeing and purging behaviors, which can effect cell function throughout the entire body.
• Tears in the espohagus can require surgery and rotting of the teeth cause many patients to have many or all of their teeth removed and replaced with expensive vaneers.
• Hair loss, bone degradation, loss of intestinal function, and damage to the reproductive system are all possible with an eating disorder.
• It is possible that you will not be able to have children, or that you may require a colostomy bag (a bag that is permanently attached to your lower abdomen to catch feces being moved out of your GI tract) because your intestines shut down long enough to require them to be surgically removed.
• And remember, and eating disorder is not something “to try” for weight loss.  An eating disorder is a psychiatric illness, right next to schizophrenia, multiple personality disorder and many others.  The human body actually responds to restriction of food (which includes not eating, or eating and then purging) by storing nutrients.  Yes, it holds on to the nutrients you eat rather than using it for fuel and burning it.  The weight loss you see is due to the body living off of fuel from not only fat cells, but muscle cells, tissue and organ cells.  This damage can be irreversible.

Thank you to Ashley A Harris for her knowledge and help. You can contact Ashley directly with any questions at AHarrisRD@gmail.com or visit http://www.crave-health.com/.

If you think you might be on a slippery slope towards developing an eating disorder or are worried about your eating habits, visit Understanding Nutrition.com where you can give yourself a quick check and get the help you may need.

[Photo courtesy of younglivin.org]